Writing about writing instead of writing

Today was my last day of work here, and I had been hoping to skip out around 1pm and make a mad dash for Lindsey, to see her one last time before summer or god knows when. Those plans were sadly made moot, almost entirely by fault of the weather. On the way home I remembered as I passed the shopping center that my local little independent theatre was still showing Atonement and Juno, both of which I had been intending to see. As it happened, I arrived exactly in time for the last matinée showing of Atonement.

I had been hoping for Juno to lighten my mood, but I knew I had to see Atonement alone, whereas Juno I could watch back in Portland with Travis. I usually have to watch dramas alone -- I get too emotionally involved and invested in the characters, and it's just... not comfortable to have someone around when I'm like that.

I also saw a preview for Persepolis, based on the graphic novels, and it looks bloody brilliant. I hope I can go see it soon, with someone.

Atonement was a film about many things, but I think high on the list, if not chief among those, was writing. Atonement was a film about writing for me.

I started a novella last night. Or, I think it is to be a novella. Knowing me it will become a trilogy of novels, but I am hoping that I can restrain myself and tell the story as it wants to be told, and that's all. I am sure there is a novella there; it's entirely too much for a short story.

All three protagonists are women... which is very strange for me, as in everything but my memoirs, my protagonists have been male. Certainly the main...est... character in the story I've been working on longest (and which will probably also be the longest thing I ever write, god help me) is male. I'm not sure why this is, but...

It might be revealing that my reasons for trying to write this story, besides the fact that it wants to be told, have a lot to do with... wanting to understand. There is something that I don't understand and I'm not sure I have much sympathy for, and other things I probably empathize with too well, and so don't understand either. I haven't approached my writing feeling I had all the answers in a very, very long time -- I always have questions. Writing is always about understanding for me -- I always want to be able to feel more deeply what the story is saying. But it has never really been this explicit before: when I realized that I had a story, I knew immediately that it would be a story I would only understand once I had finished it. I don't understand any of my stories right away, of course, but it has always come as a mild surprise to me when I found out something about my stories I hadn't known before. This time, I know that all I have are questions, and that the story might not have all the answers, but it will at least help me understand my questions better.

I'm sorry, I'm probably being terribly mysterious. I don't mean to be, I'm just... not very good at talking about my writing. I don't do it often, most especially not with my original writing. Probably also I am being utterly incomprehensible -- I don't know, does anyone else have this... uh, theme, going with their stories? Does everyone else understand their stories right when the idea comes to them, and I'm the only one who fumbles around in the dark until it's over? Maybe I am doing it wrong XD

Regardless, the protagonists are three women. I know exactly where the idea for this story came from -- I can trace the conversation with Lindsey from about a year ago, recent events in my family, and reading and discussing the Twilight series with Nay. The latter is maybe somewhat embarrassing simply because the Twilight series is so bad and so very much about women in all the wrong ways. I've always been pretty, well, blind to all kinds of prejudice, especially in my entertainment. The Twilight series very neatly made me incredibly conscious of it, if only because the sexism in the books was so obvious that even I could see it. The story isn't a response to Twilight in any way, it's just that Twilight's disgusting misrepresentation of women has gotten me thinking about other representations of women. And from there, I suddenly had three women who had a story to share.

This should be interesting.